The many faces of Osage Orange

Phillip Patton · Mar 1, 2006

A while back someone was saying they'd like to see some pictures of Osage orange. Here's some pictures of some knife handles made out of osage orange which grew on my property. You can get quite a variety of color and grain if you know what to look for. Enjoy!

Raymond Richard · Mar 1, 2006

Hey Phil, Are these 6 all natural color? Thats one of my more favorite woods. WG gave me a few chucks from a tree he had planted here in Oregon many moons ago. I believe some of it was cut from the crotch. Out of the few knives I made from it this was from the most figured piece: http://www.bladegallery.com/shopexd.asp?id=2753&websess=14810415443468

Phillip Patton · Mar 1, 2006

Yes it's all natural color. Btw, the top knife in the picture on the right is Purpleheart, not osage.

Some of it is quartersawn, which produces a much different look, one which I really like.
Nice knife! Did you dye the wood?

Chant · Mar 1, 2006

Really nice wood. Love the color and grain.

Raymond Richard · Mar 1, 2006

Phillip Patton said:
Yes it's all natural color. Btw, the top knife in the picture on the right is Purpleheart, not osage. Some of it is quartersawn, which produces a much different look, one which I really like.
Nice knife! Did you dye the wood?

Purple heart, know wonder it was so dark. The knife that I gave the link to is natural. I'd sure love to get somemore like that piece but pretty rare to find osage with figure.

tnmike · Mar 1, 2006

Nice wood...Ray the hamon on your osage piece is killer...

Tom Militano · Mar 2, 2006

I bought some fustic/mora years ago. I understand it's a South American version of osage orange and it has a lot more figure and really shimmers when moved around in the light. Nice stuff.

Phillip Patton · Mar 2, 2006

Tom Militano said:
I bought some fustic/mora years ago. I understand it's a South American version of osage orange and it has a lot more figure and really shimmers when moved around in the light. Nice stuff.

You can get the same effect (to some degree) with osage by giving it a high polish or coating it with clear epoxy. The ones in the photos are coated with epoxy and have a lot of "depth". The epoxy also prevents oxidation. If they were bare wood, the bright yellow one would be dark brown by now.
Do you have any pics of your fustic/mora on a knife?